Enter Peaberry & DIY♡, Exit ManoEri

So there has been quite a lot of activity in H!P recently and it’s no surprise that it would take the summer concerts, Wkwk and Ktkr to announce all these sort of things!

First off, congrats at Naabadoufu@nana for being able to be the opening act for the concert and Kikka for once again making it to be a guest and performing “Koko Kara Hajimarunda!”.

The biggest things are the fact that two new units have been created and it’s just not for the concert! They’ll be continuing activities even after all this passes since they are kind of tagged as like a Shugo Chara Egg!/Guardians 4 kind of deal where they will be active as long as their show Hello! SATOYAMA Life continues.  So let’s take a look at this two new groups!

Peaberry

Our first group is Peaberry which consists of S/mileage member Ayaka Wada and Morning Musume member Riho Sayashi!  Now to be honest, I questioned H!P’s decision over this because to me Ayaka can’t really sing worth crap and she’s my least favorite voice in S/mileage (since Yuuka left, yeah I think I’m the only that doesn’t like Yuuka’s voice shoot me!).  Also Riho might be the powerhouse dancer of Morning Musume (next to Ayumi of course), she’s kind of shaky as a singer and she tends to yell out lyrics.  Seeing this, the two don’t seem like it’s a smart pairing but I won’t bash them until I hear “Cabbage Hakusho” (anyone else thought of Yu Yu Hakusho here?).  I feel like I know what’ll it’ll sound like but hopefully I could be proven wrong.

DIY♡

The other group, DIY♡ consists of Saki Nakajima and Maimi Yajima from °C-ute, Miyabi Natsuyaki and Chinami Tokunaga from Berryz Koubou, and Haruna Iikubo from Morning Musume!  This group is definitely the group that centers around dance so my initial thoughts was High-King 2 but no Reina or Captain (of course no Ai and Yuuka since they graduated).  The group seems to also be nature-friendly as well (kind of reminds me of Tomoiki Ki wo Uetai, that other nature-friendly group that consisted of H!P Eggs, while Peaberry kind of reminds me of EcoMoni).  DIY♡ looks good because of the 4 H!P KIDS that are in it and I’m so happy to see Chinami FINALLY get into a unit but clearly the oddball here is Haruna because she’s a poor dancer right now.  She can keep up but she lacks polish and looks kind of awkward so I’m hoping that this group will help her.  I hope their song “Forefore ~Forest for Rest~” isn’t cheesy but energetic…though I’m sure it will be a bit cheesy with the whole nature-esque motif.

 

With the future announcements of Reina’s band and 11th Generation of Morning Musume looming in the distance, 2012 seems to be a big yeah of revival in H!P…..HOWEVER during the first part of the concert we got a shocking announcement as well.

It was announced that Erina Mano would be graduating from H!P in 2013.  To me the news is surprising because I didn’t think she’d leave before BeriKyuu which means yeah it’s getting to be about that time for them to start thinking of their futures as well (can’t be Berikyuu forever ladies! THAT INCLUDES YOU TOO MOMOKO).  I mean I’ll write Erina’s profile when it gets to that time, but she’s been a better actress than a musical act to be honest and even though her music has become more stronger and better recently, it’s no surprise since she sold the least out of the acts currently.  I hope she releases one more single before graduating (and I assume there will be a best-of album announced before then too given that she’s three studio albums in and has a lot of singles).

 

The concert also gave us our first full listens to C-ute’s “Aitai Aitai Aitai na”, Berryz’ “Loving You Too Much”, S/mileage’s “Suki yo, Junjou Hankouki.”, and of course the songs from Peaberry and DIY♡.

 

Here is the setlist for Ktkr:
1. Chou HAPPY SONG / all
2. Maji de Suka Ska! / all
Opening VTR
MC / all + Makoto and Mitsui Aika – Mano Erina graduation announcement
3. Suki yo, Junjou Hankouki。/ S/mileage
4. Dot Bikini / S/mileage
5. Song for the DATE / Mano Erina
6. Banzai! 〜Jinsei wa Meccha Wonderful〜 / Mano Erina (+ 4 Kenshuusei backup dancers)
7. Aitai Aitai Aitai na / ℃-ute
8. Kimi wa Jitensha Watashi wa Densha de Kitaku / ℃-ute
MC / Makoto, Okai Chisato, Iikubo Haruna, Fukuda Kanon
9. cha cha SING / Berryz Koubou
10. Loving You Too Much / Berryz Koubou
11. One・Two・Three / Morning Musume。
12. Watashi ga Ite Kimi ga Iru / Morning Musume。
MC / Makoto, Mitsui Aika
13. Watashi ga Obaasan ni Nattemo / all
VTR – Tsunku Club. Members talking to Tsunku♂ / Tsunku♂, Ikuta Erina, Suzuki Kanon, Kudou Haruka, Okai Chisato, Shimizu Saki, Natsuyaki Miyabi, Sugaya Risako, Wada Ayaka, Fukuda Kanon
14. Cabbage Hakusho / Peaberry (Sayashi Riho, Wada Ayaka)
15. Koko Kara Hajimarunda! / Kikkawa You
16. Smile Blues / Fukuda Kanon, Tamura Meimi
17. Watashi no Jidai! / Rockys
MC – H!P haiku corner / Makoto, Mitsui Aika
18. Medley: Koko ni Iruzee! (all) → Uchouten LOVE (all) → Genkimono de Ikou! (all) → Special Genera~tion (all) → Dance de Bakoon! (Bekimasu) → Pyocopyoco Ultra (Morning Musume。, S/mileage) → Sukichan (all) → Sekaiichi HAPPY na Onna no Ko (℃-ute, 9th gen, 10th gen, S/mileage 2nd gen) → Maji Bomber!! (all) → Bravo! (all) → Yononaka Barairo (all) → Koko ni Iruzee! (all)
MC / Makoto, Mitsui Aika
19. Choto Mate Kudasai! / all

~Credits to Starra!~

(I’ll update this with the Wkwk when they perform tomorrow!)

BTW, congrats to Morning Musume for getting 100k on their first week! IT’S BEEN A LONG TIME COMING!

Also, right there are singles announced by Berryz, C-ute, S/mileage, Up Up Girls, and THE Possible planned (plus a possibility of Peaberry and DIY as well).  So exciting!!! 

That’s about it for now!

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